In recent years, electronic trading systems have gained a widespread acceptance for trading items. For example, electronic trading systems have been created which facilitate the trading of financial instruments such as stocks, bonds, currency, futures, or other suitable financial instruments.
Many of these electronic trading systems use a bid/offer process in which bids and offers are submitted to the systems by a passive side. These bids and offers are hit and lifted (or taken) by an aggressive side. For example, a passive trader may submit a “bid” to buy a particular number of 30 year U.S. Treasury Bonds at a given price. In response to such a bid, an aggressive trader may submit a “hit” in order to indicate a willingness to sell bonds to the first trader at the given price. Alternatively, a passive side trader may submit an “offer” to sell a particular number of the bonds at the given price, and then the aggressive side trader may submit a “lift” (or “take”) in response to the offer to indicate a willingness to buy bonds from the passive side trader at the given price. In such trading systems, the bid, the offer, the hit, and the lift (or take) may be collectively known as “orders.” Thus, when a trader submits a bit, the trader is said to be submitting an order.